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Extras on Excise: Do Declining Severance Tax Revenues Await States at Finish Line in Race to the Bottom?

Oil
and gas tax revenues have made big news in the past several years as more
states are experimenting with hydraulic fracturing. At the same time, some states such as Alaska have
lowered their severance tax to encourage more companies to search for “gushers”
in their state. But other states appear to ready to declare a cease fire in the
tax competition war. Rather than continuing a race to the bottom, Ohio,
Pennsylvania and West Virginia are attempting to unify their rates. The states
appear to be exploring different tax policy approaches after many jurisdictions
experienced a decline in severance tax revenues in 2013.

In 2013, all the states combined collected
about $16.5 billion in severance taxes, according to a newly released report from
the U.S. Census Bureau.

That
sounds like big money, but it’s about 4.5 percent ($785 million) less than the
states collected last year according to last year’s report from U.S. Census Bureau .

Where did some of the decreases come
from? Fifteen states do not collect severance tax, so let’s “drill down” and
compare the top ten severance tax jurisdictions between this year and last
year’s Census report:

State

2013 Severance Tax Revenues
(in thousands)

2012 Severance Tax Revenues
(in thousands)

Difference

Texas

$4,647,848

$3,655,582

$992,266

Alaska

$4,016,966

$5,787,360

($1,770,394)

North Dakota

$2,457,530

$3,187,112

$744,305

Wyoming

$867,933

$968,525

($100,592)

Louisiana

$834,116

$885,982

($51,866)

New Mexico

$713,998

$767,736

($53,738)

West Virginia

$608,371

$626,203

($17,832)

Oklahoma

$515,981

$848,947

($332,996)

Nevada

$290,448

$303,038

($12,590)

Kentucky

$269,786

$346,050

($76,264))

Only two states out of these ten—Texas
and North Dakota—increased its severance tax revenue this year. Of all of the states that collect a severance
tax, Texas, Alaska and North Dakota took in the most severance tax at $4.6
billion, $4 billion, and $2.5 billion, respectively. While Texas took in the
most in total dollars, severance tax only accounts for around 9 percent of the total
amount of tax Texas collected. However, that
still puts Texas in around 8th place for total percentage amounting
from severance tax.

Nationwide, severance tax makes up about
2 percent of state taxes, but several states are much more dependent on the
revenue than that figure shows. The
highest percentage is collected in Alaska, where severance tax accounts for over
78 percent of taxes collected. North
Dakota gets just over 46 percent of its revenue from severance tax, and Wyoming
gets just under 40 percent.

On the other end of the spectrum, Missouri
and Connecticut took in the least amount in severance tax at $30,000 and $8,000,
respectively. As expected, they also had the lowest percentages of severance
tax compared to total tax collected.

Some states have responded to declining tax
collections by making their jurisdiction more attractive for oil and gas
producers. In November of last year,
Alaska enacted legislation to cut oil and gas severance taxes and offer tax
credits to companies in an attempt to encourage increases in production, according to theWeekly State Tax
Reportand the Washington
Post.

Other states, such as Ohio, Pennsylvania
and West Virginia are apparently seeking a cease fire in the tax competition
war by attempting to unify severance tax rates, credits and incentives to
decrease competition between each other, according to the West Virginia
newspaper, the State
Journal.

Continue the discussion onBloomberg BNA’s State Tax Group: Why do
you think severance tax collections are down compared to last year overall?Should states coordinate their severance tax
rates to reduce competition between them?

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